Remember those posters you used to flip through at the back of Spencer Gifts in the mall? The ones featuring scantily clad women — and some bare-chested dudes — looking all sexy-like into the camera? Well, apparently the not-at-all-insane people at the American Family Association are convinced that these are pornographic… and they are absolutely livid that they can be purchased at Sears.com.
The AFA recently posted a call to arms on its website. Please note that the “*”s in the following quote are theirs, because apparently the words “nudity” and “sexual” are potentially poisonous to your brain:
Sears is currently offering giant posters of total nud**y on its website. Sears knows they are selling smut. Technology allows Sears to remove and stop selling these posters within minutes, so why won’t they?
I hope you will take my word for it, but if you must see the proof, they can be found here. Warning: the posters are extremely graphic and offensive, although they have been edited by us.
These aren’t just posters of scantily-clad women. Some of them depict groups of people, lesbians and others engaged in ***ual activities. Very little is left to the imagination.
According to a site that supports the AFA’s stance on this issue, a Sears employee has responded to the group’s concerns by saying that they “have reviewed the products in question and found that they do not fall outside our marketplace guidelines.”
Not surprisingly, the AFA isn’t happy with Sears’ refusal to remove the offending items:
Sears is playing with fire. Sears is the place that American families are used to going… and I just cannot imagine that the vast majority of their customer base wants to shop at a place that’s marketing pornography… There are a lot of other places that American families can shop for the same goods they get at Sears.
What do you think? Are these images too racy for the American public?
You won’t believe what Sears is selling [AFA.net via Edge Boston]
Sears Ignores Calls to Stop Selling Porn [Lifesitenews.com]
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In the words of David Cross, “Dirty, dirty, filthy titty.”
Well, I just used their email form to send a nice letter to Sears congratulating them for standing up to the wingnuts, and telling them that I’d be more inclined to spend money with them this holiday season for not bowing down to the tiny minority of crazy trying to censor them.
Why is “nudity” censored but not “smut”? They should have censored smut.
Sears sells s**t.
There we go!
While the posters are less sensational than what the AFA is making them out to be, they are sensational nonetheless.
My biggest problem is this seems like the desperate act of an aging retailer for income. Sears’ reputation is built on Kenmore, Craftsman, and reasonably-priced apparel and electronics. Not underboob.
Seriously, with all the stuff available on the net and in places like Spencers, do you think anyone goes ‘I’m so worked up right now! I need to see a hot model half naked! I know… SEARS!’
Know your customers, Mr. Sears.
I am going to continue my boycott of the AFA…please join me!
I find this amusing.
There are many, many reasons not to shop at Sears (just browse through the Consumerist archives) yet the AFA felt the need to invent a new one that doesn’t actually apply.
Typically I would never defend Sears, however I find myself forced to in this case.
I will hold my tongue, though, and resist from commenting on the general validity of the AFA.
THINK OF THE AMERICAN FAMILIES!
Dear Mr. Costello:
Where can I buy these?
I really like these posters. I want posters like these. Lots of them. Can I order them online? Are they in your stores? Will you be selling more in the future?
TIA
Ucvbn Bjfyuvs
If it doesn’t have transgender, barely legal, Japanese school girls engaged in watersports it’s not porn to me.
I think the little children who make up the AFA need desperately to take the pacifiers out of their mouths, get toilet trained and out of diapers, and just generally grow the hell up, for the first time in their sniveling little lives. Then they should go out and get real jobs so they don’t have time for this juvenile bellyaching any more.
Porn is anything in which you abruptly lose interest after masturbating.
All of a sudden I don’t find this post very interesting.
I edited their basic letter for the AFA Actionalert to the following:
Dear Mr. Costello:
I can’t understand why American Family Association (AFA) cares that Sears is choosing to sell adult materials on its website.
As a none supporter of American Family Association (AFA), we are also very happy to learn that you have casually discounted several calls from AFA by refusing to discuss our concerns.
Back-to-School is a busy time for Sears. I will certainly consider doing my shopping exclusively with sears as a result of the company’s adult-oriented product offerings.
I didn’t follow the link to the web site but I figure whether or not the posters are pornographic is moot.
The AFA made their complaint and Sears made their response. Sears says that none of it is bad enough that they can’t sell it and since they’re only selling these on their web site I don’t think it’s worth getting worked up about.
Seriously, are there any little kids going to Sears’ web site to look at smut? I doubt it.
I don’t know how to define pornography, but I know it when I see it.
And this ain’t it.
I used their cool Form Letter & just replaced all the “will not shop at Sears” with “Will shop at Sears” & turned it into a supportive letter for the business Sears to sell whatever products it wants, and crazed fanatical fringe groups to choose not to shop there.
Success!
I’m on my way to Sears to stock up on high button shoes, buggy whips and posters.
Please note that the “*”s in the following quote are theirs, because apparently the words “nudity” and “sexual” are potentially poisonous to your brain:
No, it’s because they don’t want their site to be blocked by web filtering software that looks for terms like “nudity” and “sexual”.
Someone please burn down AFA HQ. These people are lunatics.
I want to pay for overnight delivery…but I know I shouldn’t. I can wait patiently by the front door.
FYI – you can use the AFA website to send an email to Sears. I erased the default text objecting to the alleged pornography and replaced it with support and encouragement.
“Technology allows Sears to remove and stop selling these posters within minutes, so why won’t they? “
Technology also allows you to find far better ‘smut’ within minutes. Don’t they know print is a dying medium?
The *** are probably because most of their followers have insane net nanny software installed and couldn’t visit the site if those words turned up on it.
The [AFA] doth protest too much, methinks.
Guess these people don’t buy gas… most gas stations sell real porn!! Playboy, Hustler, Barely 18!!
Damn you AFA….damn you to hell. You’re making me support Sears. Assholes.
I am a Christian, but folks like these give me a bad name. I mean…zomg a lady in a bikini! I hate Jesus forever now *flails and falls on floor* satan has taken overrrr!
American Family needs to get a life.
I’m sure the AFA spent alot of time staring at these images to determine if they are truly of pornographic nature.
They even display these unedited pornographic images on their own website so others have a chance to stare and decide.
If they can’t even spell our sexual and nudity it has to make you wonder where their kids come from……
Just saying…….
Here’s the deal; Sears recently began to essentially farm out their website by selling the products of tons of other internet retailers… stuff that Sears would never sell in a million years. I found this out when I was searching online for a mid-range shotgun mic (500 dollar range) and found that suddenly Sears.com is just chock full of high-end audio gear. Of course a closer look revealed that it was much like the the amazon model where certain retailers sell their inventory through amazon, allowing amazon to take a cut.
I’ll bet that these posters are just some Sears partner that automatically posted them as part of their own extensive inventory. Sears has spent the last several decades in free-fall and it doesn’t surprise me that their online efforts are as equally short sighted and poorly planned as their brick and mortar offerings.
Of course the big problem with this is that any internet-savvy consumer would never buy, say, high-end electronics from Sears.com because the sears cut renders the prices too high. They are left with less-savvy consumers who think that they are getting the comfort of a historic brand like Sears to support their purchase. Then when their expensive audio-technica mic dies and they drive to their local sears store for a replacement or a refund… they are greeted with proto-simian blank stares from the staff…
For a company that was so amazingly successful in the catalog-world for generations, its amazing how poorly Sears has seemed to translate that success into the online world.
I don’t agree with calling these images pornography, but they are sexual images except for the poster of the painting.
Although I do not agree with AFA, these images are sexual and I am a little surprised that they are on Sears website.
What a bunch of nutbags.
I am TOTALLY SHOCKED! Sears is still open????
They lost me completely when they put in classic paintings. Um… depicting a nude person isn’t always about sex. It’s just the human body, so what?
Some are racy, but really, we see these posters for sale all over and never pay them any mind. Look around Amazon and see what posters they sell. Try Overstock, or any other large online retailer.
I’m going to repeat my response from another site that was discussing this topic a week ago. I know there’s going to be more than one person who won’t like what I have to say, but it ties in given this group’s leanings.
“The supposed brouhaha is about Sears selling posters on their website that just happen to have these images on them. In my not so humble opinion the fundamentalist Christians who object to this stuff really need to get out more often. In fact, I’ve got a wonderful idea for them.
Join the real world.
What these people find objectionable other people (like me and I think a large segment of the population) don’t.
We now return you to your regularly scheduled programming.”
Wow, who knew the words “nudity” and “sexual” were obscene words and not even fit for print?
Are you kidding? These are the same people who want everyone to boycott the new William Shatner sitcom on NBC this fall: @#&! My Dad Says [sic] because to them, even using symbols to replace the “profane” word is offensive.
You read that right: even the SYMBOLS used to replace the word “shit” are offensive.
You cannot make this stuff up. How uptight can you be.
WOW, who knew that if you read the original page, you’ll see that the message was written for email and they didn’t want it to get bounced by their member’s spam filters.
I often get the impression that the “Wildmen” at the AFA write about these “offensive” things with one hand on the keyboard and one hand on their….. request for money. For the AFA has been like a 10 year old highlighting dirty words in a dictionary. I love how they talk about the horrible impact of such smut but spend hours recording it for posterity. I once wrote them and told them their newsletter was awesome because now I knew all the dirty shows to watch.
My guess is that the tremendous gay hatred of Don and family hides some skeletons in the closet.
Unless I can see all these pictures as they appear on Sears, I don’t believe the AFA’s accusation.
What’s weird is I had heard this article and then looked at the sale ad for Sears in the Sunday paper and the picture on front was pretty raunchy. I tried to find a link and couldn’t.
Wonder what would happen if (gasp!) they ever came across a Victoria’s Secret catalogue? An American Apparel billboard? A Calvin Klein ad in the latest Vanity Fair? What in the name of J*s*s (hey, if they can censor “obscene” words, so can I) would they scream about then? Another boycott campaign? Ask Howard Stern how well those did.
How many bloody warnings do they think I need to see some nudity?
Are you sure? Yes
Are you REALLY sure? Yes
Okay..here it is…BUT BE WARNED THAT YOU MAY NOT BE SURE!
Okay, did anyone get the concept that ‘nudity’ and ‘sexual’ are bad words, but yet SMUT isn’t? LOL
*Shakes head and walks away* The AFA don’t fight for families. For all concerns, it’s a cult.
Pornography is legal. Obscenity is not legal. The distinction is lost on the vast majority of the American population and lost on 100% of the AFA.
the AFA is just another wingnut christian zealot group. Just like Focus on the Family. Ignore them.
In my experience people who get so up-in-arms over things like this usually are doing so because they have something they’re ashamed of they want to hide, so I wonder what filthy little fettishes these so-called “pro-family” people are indulging in?
ummm… yea the AFA has waaaaaay to much time on there hands. They should be disbanded and I hope my tax dollars are not paying for anything they do.. really, waste of time and money.
If they think this is porn I could send them some links that would show them the difference.
So have they boycotted museums yet?
I wonder who is running this orgainzation now. The guy who started it used to teach at a public school, I had met him a few times and he seemed like a decent guy (a bit of a stuffed shirt-type, but nice enough). I also knew his adopted son quite well. Neither seemed to be the type to react to this that strongly. Yes, these pictures should not be available to minors, but they aren’t even against Christianity (the one in the center is close, though) to see as they are clothed and not overtly sexual.
Personally, I think that porn should continue to exist for adults to view if they want to. I don’t believe that it is a detriment to society in any manner. Sears should ask for an age verification before selling or allowing viewing of these pictures, but if adults want them, that is fine.
Really? Not porn? View this and scroll to the bottom of the page to see what others who have looked at this image have viewed. Your article and the pictures at the top are so tame to what’s really on Sears.com. Just want I want my teenager looking at…
http://www.sears.com/shc/s/p_10153_12605_SPM218792703P?mv=rr